Thursday, March 22, 2012

Book recommendation

I have begun to try to break out of using Access db's (97!) and have been trying out SQL Server Express 2005 along with the SQL Management Studio Express. I am a little confused with it as I am trying to use the interface inside of VB.NET 2005 as well as the management studio and sometimes I can connect from one without the other.

Anyway this points to the fact that I have a lot to learn and I was looking for a recommendation for a book that could be a tutorial for using VB.NET 2005 with SQL Server Express. I really need something that starts from square one but hopefully builds fast. Right now it appears I need to understand connection strings (when do I put ".\sqlexpress" and when do I use the server name followed by the instance for example?).

I have tried some of the books online for example and ran into a dead end with the simple tutorial (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms165732.aspx) when the headers didn't sort, I couldn't select any other pages and the edit button didn't work. I don't have a clue what happened as I followed the instructions.

Anyway if someone could recommend something that teaches using SQL Server Express while building an application with VB2005 that would be perfect.

Dana

There are a TON of books that would help you (as I have read about .5 of them and believe or not I collect them...hey i love what I do :)). Anyway as a Wrox author I recommend the following two titles:

http://www.wrox.com/WileyCDA/WroxTitle/productCd-0764595733.html

http://www.wrox.com/WileyCDA/WroxTitle/productCd-0764589237.html

and if you want to learn SQL Server 2005's CLR integration one day then this one :)

http://www.wrox.com/WileyCDA/WroxTitle/productCd-0470054034.html

|||Derek,

Just wanted to follow up on your recommendation and say thank you. I purchased the WROX SQL Server Express Starter Kit you recommended as well as a book called Beginning SQL Server Express by Rick Dobson (mainly because Amazon gave me a package deal.. brilliant marketing move!) and although I am only beginning to read them they are exactly what I wanted .. something that starts from the very beginning and moves along fairly quickly.

My problem has been that I have lived Access97 until this so I really needed to start with a very basic understanding of the daunting world of the "server databases" and the associated management tools, leaving my cocoon of saved queries and linked tables behind and learning connection strings and stored procedures instead. This should get me on track so thank you for taking the time to reply.

Dana

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